Phew! It feels good to be back home! I'm ready to be done with travel for at least this year.
I spent all of last week in Mexico for work. I have a small set of designers who work for me and are located in central Mexico, in the city of Queretaro. I had a great time on the trip and it was wonderful meeting everyone. I had talked and worked with many of them for several years, but this was my first opportunity to meet them in person.
Somehow we were able to squeeze in 5 days of work in only 3 days of being in the office. It was tiring!
I have a handful of pictures on my phone that I will share once I download them. This is just a quick post to say that I'm back and should be able to get back to some posts this week. :-)
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Monday, August 5, 2013
Quiet Lately...
I've been pretty quiet on the blog front the past few weeks. The usual culprits are to blame... work, home, work, work.... ;-)
The past few weeks have been pretty hectic and we were trying to get ready for a vacation trip... which now is cancelled. We were originally going to be going to Hawaii for a week (two weeks for my husband due to a business conference), but unfortunately we've had to cancel the trip.
We are still going to be taking vacation next week, since we both need it, but we'll just be staying home instead. I hope to be able to get some quilting done next week. I've been doing a good amount of hand sewing lately, but nothing to really show for it.
I've been sewing hanging sleeve #1 onto the Lone Star quilt and also doing the final touches of embroidery on a small appliqued wall hanging. I need to rinse off the wall hanging a bit before I take any pictures, but I'll get some pictures of it soon.
The other notable thing going on was that we had a kitten playing around our driveway and hunting the little birds. I didn't mind it too much, but I didn't really want him sticking around either. I was hoping he'd find another home in someone else's barn with a bunch of other kitties. After a few days of seeing him around, we noticed he wasn't playing on the driveway anymore. We didn't think much of it and just figured he found somewhere else.
Yesterday while driving up the driveway on the tractor to plant some things, my husband pointed out the kitten hunkered down by the culvert near the driveway. I stopped the tractor to get a better look, and unfortunately, we noticed a bunch of flies flying around the kitten. We don't know what did it, but the kitten was dead. :-( We don't know if he just couldn't catch any food or if he was sick to begin with. We did the right thing though and buried him near the driveway at a base of a tree. We felt badly for the kitten and really had hoped he was going to be OK and just find a better barn to live in.
We'll keep our eyes out in the future for the little kittens if they show up and we'll contact animal control to have them come trap the cat before something happens to them. We haven't seen any others, but we'll definitely keep our eyes open for them.
Anyway - I hope to post some pictures later this week of the garden and the quilting I'm working on. Hope everyone is having a great Monday!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
The past few weeks have been pretty hectic and we were trying to get ready for a vacation trip... which now is cancelled. We were originally going to be going to Hawaii for a week (two weeks for my husband due to a business conference), but unfortunately we've had to cancel the trip.
We are still going to be taking vacation next week, since we both need it, but we'll just be staying home instead. I hope to be able to get some quilting done next week. I've been doing a good amount of hand sewing lately, but nothing to really show for it.
I've been sewing hanging sleeve #1 onto the Lone Star quilt and also doing the final touches of embroidery on a small appliqued wall hanging. I need to rinse off the wall hanging a bit before I take any pictures, but I'll get some pictures of it soon.
The other notable thing going on was that we had a kitten playing around our driveway and hunting the little birds. I didn't mind it too much, but I didn't really want him sticking around either. I was hoping he'd find another home in someone else's barn with a bunch of other kitties. After a few days of seeing him around, we noticed he wasn't playing on the driveway anymore. We didn't think much of it and just figured he found somewhere else.
Yesterday while driving up the driveway on the tractor to plant some things, my husband pointed out the kitten hunkered down by the culvert near the driveway. I stopped the tractor to get a better look, and unfortunately, we noticed a bunch of flies flying around the kitten. We don't know what did it, but the kitten was dead. :-( We don't know if he just couldn't catch any food or if he was sick to begin with. We did the right thing though and buried him near the driveway at a base of a tree. We felt badly for the kitten and really had hoped he was going to be OK and just find a better barn to live in.
We'll keep our eyes out in the future for the little kittens if they show up and we'll contact animal control to have them come trap the cat before something happens to them. We haven't seen any others, but we'll definitely keep our eyes open for them.
Anyway - I hope to post some pictures later this week of the garden and the quilting I'm working on. Hope everyone is having a great Monday!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
Paris - Remainder of Day 1 and Day 2
Our trip to Paris was relatively short. The first two days were really spent on the outskirts of Paris and we didn't do any "touristy" things. My posts here and here describe and show photos of the Louvre, which was the only museum we went to that allowed pictures.
After the Louvre, we went to the Musee D'Orsay. Its just across the Seine from the Louvre and it has a ton of impressionist paintings as well as some more modern paintings. Unfortunately, they did not allow photos. If you are ever in Paris though, I recommend going to the museum. We really enjoyed the impressionist paintings which were on the top floor. Even if they move things around, I would recommend going to the top floor first while you're feeling strong. Its much easier to go down the stairs after getting all the way to the top. :-)
After the Musee D'Orsay, we decided to make a quick trip over to Notre Dame. We didn't really want to go investigate the catacombs or anything like that, but I wanted to get some pictures of the cathedral and actually go inside.
I never realized it before, but Notre Dame is actually on its own island in the middle of the Seine. For some reason I always thought it was in the middle of the city proper. Here's a view walking up to the cathedral. They were getting ready to celebrate its anniversary... 850 years... so there was some platforms and other stuff that somewhat blocked the photos.
After you get up top of the platforms, there were some wooden bleachers (the sturdy kind) and you could see the entire cathedral front. Again, its amazing that some of the details in the exterior of the cathedral have lasted all these years.
Those dark windows were stained glass windows. From the inside they were stunning! It didn't feel right to take pictures inside a functional cathedral though, so I don't have any inside photos.
Of course, as we left Notre Dame, it started to rain. We had good rain coats, so we weren't too worried about it.... until it started to REALLY come down. We took shelter under a shop's awning (as did lots of other folks) and waited until the worst of the storm passed. We're glad we did since it was hailing and had sideways rain during the storm. We still ended up with wet sneakers and pants (from the knees down) when we got back to the hotel.
Thankfully we were able to dry things out in the bathroom and we used the hair dryer to dry out our sneakers. We ended up going back out a while later for dinner, which was a minor adventure.
There were police blocking off a bunch of roads in the area, which we had no idea why. We ended up having to take a long walk to get to the restaurant and while we were eating, you could see various different police vehicles driving by, stopping, gathering things, driving off again, etc. When we left the restaurant, we went the short way back to our hotel and the police let us through this time. We were fortunate that we left the restaurant when we did.... there was a demonstration on-going for pro-gay marriage. Just as we cross the main road near our hotel, the demonstration started moving and blocked the roadway from where we had eaten to where our hotel was. We just missed getting completely blocked from getting back to our hotel.
A little side tangent here.... the food in Paris... it was amazing. There were crepes and gelato everywhere. Some really great stuff. We ended up having duck one night, which was really good. The only bad thing we had.... foie gras. We watch cooking shows and everyone raves about it, so we thought... we're in the one place that it should be good, so we tried it. We just barely were able to eat it. We didn't want to be rude to the chef, so we made sure between the two of us to eat the whole thing. It was a bit rough though.
So our last full day in Paris we went to one final museum which we missed when we were visiting the Louvre. Its called Musee L'Orangie (or something like that). Its in the far corner of the gardens in front of the Louvre. The best part was that this particular museum has two rooms of huge (and I mean huge, panorama) paintings from Monet's Waterlilies series. They were beautiful. It makes me want to make one out of needlepoint! ;-)
After viewing the paintings, we made the long walk over to the Eiffel tower (about 2 miles). It was actually nice because we weren't in the tourist areas and we were just walking through the streets of Paris. There were no pick pocketers, there were no rude tourists, just Parisians going about their business. We really enjoyed the walk.
At the end of the gardens near the Louvre is an Egyptian obelisk. It was pretty impressive, even from a distance.
And here we are at the base of the Eiffel Tower. Its somewhat "ugly", but still impressive in its size.
There were elevators you could take to the top of the tower, or you could walk up the stairs. We opted for neither because the wait to just get to the base of the tower....4 hours. Yuck!
So we took our pictures, can say we were there and then we walked back to the hotel.
We thought about going to the Arc de Triomphe, but it was another 1.5 miles away from the hotel, which would have meant a 4 mile hike back to the hotel. We were glad to just take a nice relaxing stroll back to the hotel after seeing the tower. Again, it was through the less touristy areas of Paris and it was a nice walk. We were able to get more of a feel for what the city really is like for people who live there.
Overall, we had a great time in Paris. Being "country folk", we were glad to come back home to our 16 acres in upstate NY. After 2 days, we were pretty much on sensory overload due to the constant crush of people and things going on. City-life just isn't us.
We did enjoy it though and I would probably do it again if it meant we could go out into the French country-side a bit more. I think that's the part of France that the two of us would really enjoy.
I would have to say if anyone is thinking of visiting there, whatever you do... do not drive anywhere in the city. The traffic is absolutely insane. The people on motorcycles basically do not follow any rules of the road and make their own lanes whenever they feel like it. They zip in and around traffic at all speeds and its very unnerving... even as a passenger!
I hope to get back to more quilting related posts now that I've pretty much covered our quick trip to Paris. I'm slowly getting back into the swing of things here, so I'm sure I'll have something quilty to post soon. :-)
In the meantime....
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
After the Louvre, we went to the Musee D'Orsay. Its just across the Seine from the Louvre and it has a ton of impressionist paintings as well as some more modern paintings. Unfortunately, they did not allow photos. If you are ever in Paris though, I recommend going to the museum. We really enjoyed the impressionist paintings which were on the top floor. Even if they move things around, I would recommend going to the top floor first while you're feeling strong. Its much easier to go down the stairs after getting all the way to the top. :-)
After the Musee D'Orsay, we decided to make a quick trip over to Notre Dame. We didn't really want to go investigate the catacombs or anything like that, but I wanted to get some pictures of the cathedral and actually go inside.
I never realized it before, but Notre Dame is actually on its own island in the middle of the Seine. For some reason I always thought it was in the middle of the city proper. Here's a view walking up to the cathedral. They were getting ready to celebrate its anniversary... 850 years... so there was some platforms and other stuff that somewhat blocked the photos.
After you get up top of the platforms, there were some wooden bleachers (the sturdy kind) and you could see the entire cathedral front. Again, its amazing that some of the details in the exterior of the cathedral have lasted all these years.
Those dark windows were stained glass windows. From the inside they were stunning! It didn't feel right to take pictures inside a functional cathedral though, so I don't have any inside photos.
Of course, as we left Notre Dame, it started to rain. We had good rain coats, so we weren't too worried about it.... until it started to REALLY come down. We took shelter under a shop's awning (as did lots of other folks) and waited until the worst of the storm passed. We're glad we did since it was hailing and had sideways rain during the storm. We still ended up with wet sneakers and pants (from the knees down) when we got back to the hotel.
Thankfully we were able to dry things out in the bathroom and we used the hair dryer to dry out our sneakers. We ended up going back out a while later for dinner, which was a minor adventure.
There were police blocking off a bunch of roads in the area, which we had no idea why. We ended up having to take a long walk to get to the restaurant and while we were eating, you could see various different police vehicles driving by, stopping, gathering things, driving off again, etc. When we left the restaurant, we went the short way back to our hotel and the police let us through this time. We were fortunate that we left the restaurant when we did.... there was a demonstration on-going for pro-gay marriage. Just as we cross the main road near our hotel, the demonstration started moving and blocked the roadway from where we had eaten to where our hotel was. We just missed getting completely blocked from getting back to our hotel.
A little side tangent here.... the food in Paris... it was amazing. There were crepes and gelato everywhere. Some really great stuff. We ended up having duck one night, which was really good. The only bad thing we had.... foie gras. We watch cooking shows and everyone raves about it, so we thought... we're in the one place that it should be good, so we tried it. We just barely were able to eat it. We didn't want to be rude to the chef, so we made sure between the two of us to eat the whole thing. It was a bit rough though.
So our last full day in Paris we went to one final museum which we missed when we were visiting the Louvre. Its called Musee L'Orangie (or something like that). Its in the far corner of the gardens in front of the Louvre. The best part was that this particular museum has two rooms of huge (and I mean huge, panorama) paintings from Monet's Waterlilies series. They were beautiful. It makes me want to make one out of needlepoint! ;-)
After viewing the paintings, we made the long walk over to the Eiffel tower (about 2 miles). It was actually nice because we weren't in the tourist areas and we were just walking through the streets of Paris. There were no pick pocketers, there were no rude tourists, just Parisians going about their business. We really enjoyed the walk.
At the end of the gardens near the Louvre is an Egyptian obelisk. It was pretty impressive, even from a distance.
And here we are at the base of the Eiffel Tower. Its somewhat "ugly", but still impressive in its size.
There were elevators you could take to the top of the tower, or you could walk up the stairs. We opted for neither because the wait to just get to the base of the tower....4 hours. Yuck!
So we took our pictures, can say we were there and then we walked back to the hotel.
We thought about going to the Arc de Triomphe, but it was another 1.5 miles away from the hotel, which would have meant a 4 mile hike back to the hotel. We were glad to just take a nice relaxing stroll back to the hotel after seeing the tower. Again, it was through the less touristy areas of Paris and it was a nice walk. We were able to get more of a feel for what the city really is like for people who live there.
Overall, we had a great time in Paris. Being "country folk", we were glad to come back home to our 16 acres in upstate NY. After 2 days, we were pretty much on sensory overload due to the constant crush of people and things going on. City-life just isn't us.
We did enjoy it though and I would probably do it again if it meant we could go out into the French country-side a bit more. I think that's the part of France that the two of us would really enjoy.
I would have to say if anyone is thinking of visiting there, whatever you do... do not drive anywhere in the city. The traffic is absolutely insane. The people on motorcycles basically do not follow any rules of the road and make their own lanes whenever they feel like it. They zip in and around traffic at all speeds and its very unnerving... even as a passenger!
I hope to get back to more quilting related posts now that I've pretty much covered our quick trip to Paris. I'm slowly getting back into the swing of things here, so I'm sure I'll have something quilty to post soon. :-)
In the meantime....
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Monday, April 22, 2013
Paris - Visiting The Louvre Part II
Here is part 2 of visiting the Louvre in Paris last week. I obviously could not take pictures of everything, but here's a sampling of the paintings we saw.
In walking through some of the rooms on the upper floors, I realized there were some good views of the rest of the city. Through one particular window, I had a really great view of the Eiffel Tower.
The picture below happens to be a Rembrant. The museum had a lot of works from Rembrant in a handful of rooms.
There were also some amazing sculptures from Mesopotamia. This one just struck me with the detail in it. To think that someone (probably a slave) carved this all by hand with small tools is just amazing.
Look at the detail in that beard! And the chevrons in the "leaves" on the chest plate...
This one was with the Greek artifacts. It was pretty interesting and you could clearly see the effects of the environment on the stone.
In the Egyptian areas, they only had partial pieces of some of the artifacts, but the museum folks were able to provide sketches of the missing pieces so you could get an idea of what the whole thing would have looked like thousands of years ago.
We couldn't pass up a picture of Rama-sees. :-)
This next area of paintings were some more Rembrants and were near the Mona Lisa. This painting was absolutely huge. The people in the painting were actually larger than life-sized!
I ended up not getting a picture of the Mona Lisa, but we did see it. In that particular room, there was an area to direct the crowd toward the painting and then away from it, and it was just a huge mass of people shoved together. Since pick-pockets are a huge problem in the museum, we decided that we did not want to put ourselves in the middle of the huge throng of people. That was just asking for trouble!
After leaving the Louvre, we took a walk through the gardens right next to the museum. The flowers and trees really weren't in bloom yet since it had been a cold winter, but it was still nice to walk through.
If you look closely, there are some annuals (hyacinths, daffodils, etc.) blooming.
Looking back at the Louvre from outside the gardens.
We then crossed over the Seine, which by the way, is a lot choppier and dirtier than I would have originally expected. After I thought about it though, it is a major river through a major city, so its not really unexpected that its dirty.
After crossing the Seine, we went to the Musee D'Orsay. There are a ton of great impressionist paintings in there, but they did not allow photography. We spent probably 2 hours walking through that museum.
We also took a walk over to Notre Dame, but I'll share those pictures as well as our trip to the Eiffel Tower in the next post.
We did a lot of walking in the 2 days that we were in central Paris. Based on Google Maps, we walked about 10 miles each day. It was beautiful while we were there though. There were a few sprinkles here and there and one afternoon there was a 20 minute downpour, but other than that, the weather was very nice. A bit on the cool side, but not bad for those of us used to the cold northeast!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
In walking through some of the rooms on the upper floors, I realized there were some good views of the rest of the city. Through one particular window, I had a really great view of the Eiffel Tower.
The picture below happens to be a Rembrant. The museum had a lot of works from Rembrant in a handful of rooms.
There were also some amazing sculptures from Mesopotamia. This one just struck me with the detail in it. To think that someone (probably a slave) carved this all by hand with small tools is just amazing.
Look at the detail in that beard! And the chevrons in the "leaves" on the chest plate...
This one was with the Greek artifacts. It was pretty interesting and you could clearly see the effects of the environment on the stone.
In the Egyptian areas, they only had partial pieces of some of the artifacts, but the museum folks were able to provide sketches of the missing pieces so you could get an idea of what the whole thing would have looked like thousands of years ago.
We couldn't pass up a picture of Rama-sees. :-)
This next area of paintings were some more Rembrants and were near the Mona Lisa. This painting was absolutely huge. The people in the painting were actually larger than life-sized!
I ended up not getting a picture of the Mona Lisa, but we did see it. In that particular room, there was an area to direct the crowd toward the painting and then away from it, and it was just a huge mass of people shoved together. Since pick-pockets are a huge problem in the museum, we decided that we did not want to put ourselves in the middle of the huge throng of people. That was just asking for trouble!
After leaving the Louvre, we took a walk through the gardens right next to the museum. The flowers and trees really weren't in bloom yet since it had been a cold winter, but it was still nice to walk through.
If you look closely, there are some annuals (hyacinths, daffodils, etc.) blooming.
Looking back at the Louvre from outside the gardens.
We then crossed over the Seine, which by the way, is a lot choppier and dirtier than I would have originally expected. After I thought about it though, it is a major river through a major city, so its not really unexpected that its dirty.
After crossing the Seine, we went to the Musee D'Orsay. There are a ton of great impressionist paintings in there, but they did not allow photography. We spent probably 2 hours walking through that museum.
We also took a walk over to Notre Dame, but I'll share those pictures as well as our trip to the Eiffel Tower in the next post.
We did a lot of walking in the 2 days that we were in central Paris. Based on Google Maps, we walked about 10 miles each day. It was beautiful while we were there though. There were a few sprinkles here and there and one afternoon there was a 20 minute downpour, but other than that, the weather was very nice. A bit on the cool side, but not bad for those of us used to the cold northeast!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Friday, April 19, 2013
Paris - Visiting The Louvre Part I
The first full day in the center of Paris was spent mostly walking through The Louvre museum. You could spend years walking through that place and not really see everything in there. It truly is an amazing collection of artifacts, paintings and sculptures.
I forgot to take a picture of the famous glass pyramid when walking in, but was able to get a shot as we left. See all those people... when we first got to the museum at 10am, there was only about 20 people in line/milling about. As the day wore on, the lines got longer and longer to get in.
One of the first areas we went to after entering was the Roman sculptures. There were absolutely fabulous. To think that people made these detailed sculptures without the tools that we have today. All the sculptures in the pictures below that are in the "atrium" were actually all outdoors at one point in time. They've now been enclosed in this glass atrium to ensure they don't degrade any more from the elements.
After getting past the main courtyard, we found a ton more sculptures. The detail on this cape as absolutely stunning!
I don't recall what this next one was from, but the intricacy of it was unbelievable! The whole thing stood probably about 8 feet tall, but the small details inside were easily less than a 1/4".
Here's a close-up:
There was also this beautiful archway with very detailed carving in it.
After going through most of the sculptures (which I took photos of about 1%), we made a brief tour through Napoleon's quarters. We weren't really that interested in it, but we were trying to find out way through the buildings to the next area we wanted to see. I didn't take a lot of photos of Napoleon's quarters (living spaces), but the few that I did take were pretty breath-taking.
The ornate details in the ceilings, walls, and the chandelier were incredible. In one room they had it setup for a dining room that could probably seat 50 people. The wood table was absolutely stunning!
The gold details on the doors and walls was very impressive. One could probably say that they should peel off that gold and help fund the economy, but it would be heart-breaking to ruin these treasures that have been around for so many centuries.
The next post that I do will show the paintings that we saw in the next areas of the museum. I didn't want to make the posts too long with the pictures, so I'm trying to break it up a bit and put it into manageable sizes.
Enjoy!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
I forgot to take a picture of the famous glass pyramid when walking in, but was able to get a shot as we left. See all those people... when we first got to the museum at 10am, there was only about 20 people in line/milling about. As the day wore on, the lines got longer and longer to get in.
One of the first areas we went to after entering was the Roman sculptures. There were absolutely fabulous. To think that people made these detailed sculptures without the tools that we have today. All the sculptures in the pictures below that are in the "atrium" were actually all outdoors at one point in time. They've now been enclosed in this glass atrium to ensure they don't degrade any more from the elements.
After getting past the main courtyard, we found a ton more sculptures. The detail on this cape as absolutely stunning!
I don't recall what this next one was from, but the intricacy of it was unbelievable! The whole thing stood probably about 8 feet tall, but the small details inside were easily less than a 1/4".
Here's a close-up:
There was also this beautiful archway with very detailed carving in it.
After going through most of the sculptures (which I took photos of about 1%), we made a brief tour through Napoleon's quarters. We weren't really that interested in it, but we were trying to find out way through the buildings to the next area we wanted to see. I didn't take a lot of photos of Napoleon's quarters (living spaces), but the few that I did take were pretty breath-taking.
The ornate details in the ceilings, walls, and the chandelier were incredible. In one room they had it setup for a dining room that could probably seat 50 people. The wood table was absolutely stunning!
The gold details on the doors and walls was very impressive. One could probably say that they should peel off that gold and help fund the economy, but it would be heart-breaking to ruin these treasures that have been around for so many centuries.
The next post that I do will show the paintings that we saw in the next areas of the museum. I didn't want to make the posts too long with the pictures, so I'm trying to break it up a bit and put it into manageable sizes.
Enjoy!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Paris - First 2 Days
Our trip to Paris was a rather short one, but we enjoyed ourselves. We left Albany, NY around noon on Tuesday and arrived in Paris at 8am the following morning (Wednesday). Of course, neither of us slept on the plane, so we were pretty exhausted when we arrived in Paris. There was a young child on the plane a few seats ahead of us that was quiet while all the lights were on and they were serving dinner, but then when they turned the lights off to allow folks to sleep, the child decided it was time to get up. Go figure!
Below is a quick map of Paris. The center of Paris is at the bottom and the word "Paris" is just about where Notre Dame is located as well as the Louvre. The "A" bubble in the upper left hand... that's where we had to stay the first two days for my husband's conference.
It wasn't a particularly great section of Paris and to get there from the airport was interesting. The taxi driver ended up taking us through some of the "slum" sections of Paris, which we weren't really expecting. Either way, we arrived at the hotel and didn't really do much that day because we were both very tired and my husband had to give a presentation the following day.
Thursday was spent working while in the hotel, but after my husband got done with his meetings, we checked out of the hotel and headed to our hotel that was directly in the center of Paris.
The "A" in the map above is where we actually stayed. The hotel was less than a mile from Notre Dame and about 1.5 miles from the Louvre. We were located in the Latin Quarter and near Sorbonne university. The area was very nice with a lot of folks able to speak English, which was a bonus for us.
The hotel we stayed at was called Hotel Design De La Sorbonne (http://www.hotelsorbonne.com/). It was a great place to stay. There were a lot of places to eat that were VERY close to the hotel and the hotel was very clean and modern. Here's what our room looked like:
In the corner, they had a MAC computer that worked as both the TV as well as computer for the room. They also had free Wi-Fi, which was really nice. The little door in the picture below is the bathroom.
If you've never traveled to Europe, the biggest shocker is the size of the hotel rooms and bathrooms. Thankfully we are both small people, so we didn't really have any issues with the bathroom. However, a larger person (180+) would probably have some issues with the bathrooms.
The nicest part about the hotel was that the staff was very friendly and helpful. They all spoke English and they even had a few folks who spoke German, Russian and Italian. They gave us directions and suggestions of places nearby to eat, which was great.
Since we didn't get into the center of Paris until 7:45 in the evening on Thursday, all we did was eat and then go to bed. The next day (Friday) was when we started our tour of Paris, which involved:
- the Louvre
- musee d'Orsay
- Notre Dame
- musee l'orangie
- Pantheon
- Eiffel Tower
We ended up walking somewhere between 15 and 20 miles in 2 days, so we were pretty beat by the time we were ready to leave.
Tomorrow I'll start to share some of the photos taken at the Louvre. Some of the museums wouldn't allow photographs, but the Louvre was fine as long as you didn't use the flash on your camera.
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Below is a quick map of Paris. The center of Paris is at the bottom and the word "Paris" is just about where Notre Dame is located as well as the Louvre. The "A" bubble in the upper left hand... that's where we had to stay the first two days for my husband's conference.
It wasn't a particularly great section of Paris and to get there from the airport was interesting. The taxi driver ended up taking us through some of the "slum" sections of Paris, which we weren't really expecting. Either way, we arrived at the hotel and didn't really do much that day because we were both very tired and my husband had to give a presentation the following day.
Thursday was spent working while in the hotel, but after my husband got done with his meetings, we checked out of the hotel and headed to our hotel that was directly in the center of Paris.
The "A" in the map above is where we actually stayed. The hotel was less than a mile from Notre Dame and about 1.5 miles from the Louvre. We were located in the Latin Quarter and near Sorbonne university. The area was very nice with a lot of folks able to speak English, which was a bonus for us.
The hotel we stayed at was called Hotel Design De La Sorbonne (http://www.hotelsorbonne.com/). It was a great place to stay. There were a lot of places to eat that were VERY close to the hotel and the hotel was very clean and modern. Here's what our room looked like:
In the corner, they had a MAC computer that worked as both the TV as well as computer for the room. They also had free Wi-Fi, which was really nice. The little door in the picture below is the bathroom.
If you've never traveled to Europe, the biggest shocker is the size of the hotel rooms and bathrooms. Thankfully we are both small people, so we didn't really have any issues with the bathroom. However, a larger person (180+) would probably have some issues with the bathrooms.
The nicest part about the hotel was that the staff was very friendly and helpful. They all spoke English and they even had a few folks who spoke German, Russian and Italian. They gave us directions and suggestions of places nearby to eat, which was great.
Since we didn't get into the center of Paris until 7:45 in the evening on Thursday, all we did was eat and then go to bed. The next day (Friday) was when we started our tour of Paris, which involved:
- the Louvre
- musee d'Orsay
- Notre Dame
- musee l'orangie
- Pantheon
- Eiffel Tower
We ended up walking somewhere between 15 and 20 miles in 2 days, so we were pretty beat by the time we were ready to leave.
Tomorrow I'll start to share some of the photos taken at the Louvre. Some of the museums wouldn't allow photographs, but the Louvre was fine as long as you didn't use the flash on your camera.
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Back from Paris
This is going to be a quick post as I have about a million things to do after getting back from our trip to Paris, France.
The trip went well and we didn't have any problems with our flights. Getting from the airport to our hotel in Colombes, France was a little interesting as our cab driver decided to take us on a mini-tour of the slums of Paris. We were pretty sure he was trying to drive the tab up, but thankfully we had GPS on our phones and instructed him to get back on the highway and head in the correct direction.
The first day (Wednesdsay), we were absolutely exhausted. Neither of us really slept on the plane, so we were glad to get to our hotel and just take a nap. We piddled around the hotel that first day to figure out what we wanted to do and where we could go. On Thursday, my husband went to his meetings while I did some work from the hotel room. I was trying not to burn too many vacation days.
Thursday evening we moved to our other hotel in the Latin Quarter of Paris. It was a great hotel and the staff was very helpful. We then spent the next two days wandering around Paris and visiting the usual sites (the Louvre, Notre Dame, Musee D'Orsay, Eiffel Tower, etc.). We had a great time.
On Sunday, we were up before the crack of dawn (4am Paris time), and were picked up by our cab taxi at 6am to head to the airport. I headed back to the US, while my husband continued on to Germany. The flight back was long and I was definitely glad to be back on US soil. I didn't actually get home until 8pm NY time, so it made for a very long day.
I'll be sure to download my pictures and start sharing them over the next few days!
Au Revoir, Paris!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
The trip went well and we didn't have any problems with our flights. Getting from the airport to our hotel in Colombes, France was a little interesting as our cab driver decided to take us on a mini-tour of the slums of Paris. We were pretty sure he was trying to drive the tab up, but thankfully we had GPS on our phones and instructed him to get back on the highway and head in the correct direction.
The first day (Wednesdsay), we were absolutely exhausted. Neither of us really slept on the plane, so we were glad to get to our hotel and just take a nap. We piddled around the hotel that first day to figure out what we wanted to do and where we could go. On Thursday, my husband went to his meetings while I did some work from the hotel room. I was trying not to burn too many vacation days.
Thursday evening we moved to our other hotel in the Latin Quarter of Paris. It was a great hotel and the staff was very helpful. We then spent the next two days wandering around Paris and visiting the usual sites (the Louvre, Notre Dame, Musee D'Orsay, Eiffel Tower, etc.). We had a great time.
On Sunday, we were up before the crack of dawn (4am Paris time), and were picked up by our cab taxi at 6am to head to the airport. I headed back to the US, while my husband continued on to Germany. The flight back was long and I was definitely glad to be back on US soil. I didn't actually get home until 8pm NY time, so it made for a very long day.
I'll be sure to download my pictures and start sharing them over the next few days!
Au Revoir, Paris!
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Oui! Oui!
I've been a little lax in blogging lately. We've been very busy with work and preparing for our upcoming trip. My husband has a conference to go to and I'm tagging along because... well.... its in Paris, France!
Since his work is paying for his flight and hotel, it doesn't take much for us to pay for my flight and food. How often do you get a chance to go to Paris anyway?!
So my blogging this week will also be a little lax. I may be able to post from Paris, but we'll see how much time I have. There will definitely be a lot of pictures shared after I return. :-)
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
Since his work is paying for his flight and hotel, it doesn't take much for us to pay for my flight and food. How often do you get a chance to go to Paris anyway?!
So my blogging this week will also be a little lax. I may be able to post from Paris, but we'll see how much time I have. There will definitely be a lot of pictures shared after I return. :-)
Happy Crafting!
~Sarah at upstateNYCreations
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